Panopticon

Star Wars Kid: The Rise of the Digital Shadows

March 2022 •French

Ghyslain Raza, better known as the “Star Wars Kid,” breaks his silence to reflect on our hunger for content and the right to be forgotten in the digital age.

Kim Dotcom: Caught in the Web

March 2017 •English

The larger-than-life story of Kim Dotcom, the 'most wanted man online', is extraordinary enough, but the battle between Dotcom and the US Government and entertainment industry—being fought in New Zealand—is one that goes to the heart of ownership, privacy and piracy in the digital age.

Nothing to Hide

September 2017 •English

NOTHING TO HIDE is an independent documentary dealing with surveillance and its acceptance by the general public through the "I have nothing to hide" argument. The documentary was produced and directed by a pair of Berlin-based journalists, Mihaela Gladovic and Marc Meillassoux. It was crowdfunded by over 400 backers. NOTHING TO HIDE questions the growing, puzzling and passive public acceptance of massive corporate and governmental incursions into individual and group privacy and rights. After the emotion initially triggered by the Snowden revelations, it seems that the general public has finally accepted to live in a monitored digital world.

HAK_MTL

May 2019 •French

Does privacy still exist in 2019? In less than a generation, the internet has become a mass surveillance machine based on one simple mindset: If it's free, you're the product. Our information is captured, stored and made accessible to corporations and governments across the world. To the hacker community, Big Brother is real and only a technological battle can defeat him.

Smash His Camera

July 2010 •English

A film centering on the life and work of Ron Galella that examines the nature and effect of paparazzi.

Big Brother: A World Under Surveillance

March 2020 •French

Under the pretext of fighting terrorism or crime, the major powers have embarked on a dangerous race for surveillance technologies. Facial recognition cameras, emotion detectors, citizen rating systems, autonomous drones… A security obsession that in some countries is giving rise to a new form of political regime: numerical totalitarianism. Orwell's nightmare.

The Human Face of Big Data

February 2016 •English

With the rapid emergence of digital devices, an unstoppable, invisible force is changing human lives in ways from the microscopic to the gargantuan: Big Data, a word that was barely used a few years ago but now governs the day for many of us from the moment we awaken to the extinguishing of the final late-evening light bulb. This massive gathering and analyzing of data in real time is allowing us to not only address some of humanity biggest challenges but is also helping create a new kind of planetary nervous system. Yet as Edward Snowden and the release of the Prism documents have shown, the accessibility of all these data comes at a steep price. The Human Face of Big Data captures the promise and peril of this extraordinary knowledge revolution.

Loyalty Cards: Are They Worth It?

January 2024 •English

Alexis Conran investigates whether loyalty cards save consumers money when shopping, looking into the possibility that supermarkets could be inflating prices only to discount them. Alexis discovers how supermarkets offer a reduced price in return for an exchange of data from shoppers, speaking to those responsible for handling the data and making profits from it.

Satan's System 666

January 1994 •English

Terry Cook cuts through the camouflage of confusion that has been created to "cover up" the intended crime of the century. What crime? The pre-meditated madness to identify every man, woman and child with the Mark Of The Beast. This insidious Satanic System is what Biblical prophesy refers to with the number 666.

The War On Code: Investigating the Tornado Cash Sanctions and the Arrest of Alexey Pertsev

December 2022 •English

A film on Tornado Cash and the arrest of Alexey Pertsev.

Your Face is Ours: The Dangers of Facial Recognition Software

June 2023 •English

New York-based tech company Clearview AI is working to identify and compile the faces of every human being on the planet. The firm claims that its database will serve as a force for good, helping to solve crimes and prevent espionage. But what if Clearview AI’s powerful facial recognition software, that could potentially be used for mass surveillance and profiling, fell into the wrong hands? What if it already has?

My private life on the Internet

September 2010 •French

Pros and cons of private life going public

Erasing David

January 2009 •English

David Bond lives in one of the most intrusive surveillance states in the world. He decides to find out how much private companies and the government know about him by putting himself under surveillance and attempting to disappear, a decision that changes his life forever. Leaving his pregnant wife and young child behind, he is tracked across the database state on a chilling journey that forces him to contemplate the meaning of privacy and the loss of it.

Documentary: Moving

April 2023 •Czech

Shame/Fame

September 2017 •English

Movie about modern privacy.

Peep Culture

February 2011 •English

Pop culture has become “Peep Culture”, where we’ve traded privacy for notoriety and, in the process, reinvented mass culture. But what does it all mean and how is it changing us? Hal Niedzviecki, a 38 year old husband and father, plunges into “deep peep”, with webcams exposing his every move and millions of potential internet viewers invited to watch and engage in the spectacle.

No More Privacy: All About You

October 1993 •English

A camera crew stood on a freeway overpass & picked a car license number at random. This documentary shows what they were able to learn in half a day by searching public records & spending $13: a dossier on two people they'd never met, containing the car owners' names, where they live, their business & its financial status, their religion, the husband's health problems, the names of their grandchildren, the basic floor plan of their home. Program examines rapid exchange of vast amounts of information made possible by computers & bought & sold without the subject's knowledge or permission.

The Exam

January 2015 •English

THE EXAM is a taut, contemporary, psychological thriller about a man whose promotion hinges on him taking a medical exam. After a home visit with his pregnant wife and six-year-old son present, he finds out that the medical examiner has a more insidious agenda.

Shadow of a Doubt

January 1943 •English

Just when Charlie is feeling especially frustrated by the lack of excitement in her small town in California, she receives wonderful news: Her uncle and namesake, Charlie, is coming to visit. However, as secrets about him come to the fore, her admiration turns into suspicion.

Turtle Diary

December 1985 •English

Two separate people, a man and a woman, find something very stirring about the sea turtles in their tank at the London Zoo. They meet and form an odd, but sympathetic camaraderie as they plan to steal two of the turtles and free them into the ocean.